Starvation Hasbara

Horrifying images of masses of Palestinians, children in particular, dying of starvation and thirst, have topped media feeds in recent weeks, and been featured as well in mainstream media reports.

Hundreds of heart-rending images, particularly of children in misery, have flooded our news, and the outcry against the starvation in Gaza is worldwide.

Now the timing is made more excruciating by the release of photos of one Israeli hostage, Evyatar David, starving and emaciated, in the custody of Hamas militants.

To the Israeli and Jewish imagination, this would summon a knee-jerk response to the misery of their fellow Jew. In fact, it constitutes, perhaps, a coded message to strictly religious Jews. A message to their hearts and minds to feel for the suffering of starving Jews. And Jews only.

Another starving Israeli hostage, released in February by Hamas, spoke recently at a youth gathering in a Long Island synagogue in the USA.

Or Levy, whose wife Einav was killed in the October 7 2023 Hamas raid, told Young Israel of Woodmere, “You can’t really understand what it is to starve – day after day after day.”

With no transcript of Levy’s speech to Young Israel, I have to assume that Levy went on to describe the hundreds of thousands of starving Palestinians less than 50 miles from Israel, and the mass misery they have been facing for years now. Did he advocate, out of compassion for the children of Palestine, for Israel to allow the 6,000 UN supply trucks waiting in Jordan for 5 months to bring aid to starving Palestinians?

Forgive me, I didn’t ask him, but somehow I doubt it. Why do I doubt it?

One reason is that recently, a Palestinian activist, Awda al Hathaleen, was scheduled to speak at a synagogue in the San Francisco Bay Area, in the USA. Awda, a longtime peace activist from Massafer Yatta in the West Bank, was a principal advisor to the 2025 Academy Award-winning movie, “No Other Land”, profiling a deep friendship between journalist Yuval Abraham and Palestinian activist Basel Adra.

Awda al Hathaleen was intercepted at the airport and sent back to the West Bank. On July 28, he was shot and killed by notorious Israeli settler Yinon Levy, who was previously sanctioned by the US government for his violence.

The US wasn’t willing to allow Awda to speak, even when he was invited by Jews. But Or Levy, also invited by Jews, was welcome. That in and of itself, leads me to surmise that Or Levy would not be willing to urge Young Israel to stand against starvation, as a weapon of war.

Meanwhile, the government of Benjamin Netanyahu and his settler henchmen are crying out, even today, that the photos of Israeli hostages “prove that Hamas has no interest in reaching a ceasefire deal”.

Excerpted: ‘On Starvation Hasbara’. Courtesy: Counterpunch.org